This is an interesting article about the fellow they alternately call “Mad Dog” or the “Warrior Monk”. I have only read limited bio’s and commentaries. It seems he’s very well respected on both sides of the swamp aisle. — Gus

Just before Marine Gen. James ‘Mad Dog’ Mattis was getting ready to deploy with the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force to Iraq in early 2004, one of his colleagues asked him about the importance of reading for military officers who sometimes found themselves “too busy to read.”

The legendary general sometimes referred to as “The Warrior Monk” carted around a personal library of 6,000 books with him everywhere, and he had plenty to say on the topic. His response went viral over email, in the days before Facebook and Twitter.

Here’s what he wrote, on Nov. 20, 2003:

“… The problem with being too busy to read is that you learn by experience (or by your men’s experience), i.e. the hard way. By reading, you learn through others’ experiences, generally a better way to do business, especially in our line of work where the consequences of incompetence are so final for young men.

Thanks to my reading, I have never been caught flat-footed by any situation, never at a loss for how any problem has been addressed (successfully or unsuccessfully) before. It doesn’t give me all the answers, but it lights what is often a dark path ahead.

One Response to Gus Bailey on Trump’s Pick for Sec. of Defense

I saw where a military writer referred to Gen. Mattis as “the finest of our tribal elders.” Absolutely struck a chord with me. Everything I’ve read about him makes me wish he’d been among the officers commanding units I served in. I’ve met some very fine officers, been commanded by a few, but Mattis seems…better than any of them.